"I'll fix you, you whelps," glaring at the sturdy youngsters who had bested him. "Stow the threats, Fred," advised the cool-head, who had restored the pistol to his hip-pocket when he sized up the invaders as unarmed. "What the devil brought you here?" The newcomer put a snap in the question, but with no change of icy eye. "What devil sent them here, you'd better ask?" This suggestion from the battered Fred, who had again regained his feet. "That will all come out under pressure," intimated the cool one. "As long as you chose to honor us with a visit," he added with quiet irony, "we must get properly acquainted. Show the young gentlemen into the parlor, Fred." Billy would have started a debate there and then had he not been, as usual, stumped by the French language, which he only understood by fits and starts. He knew for sure, though, that he was in Queer Street, with this sudden shift from the regulation German talk he had been hearing since landing in the empire. It was up to Henri to set matters straight. Henri, however, had come to the conclusion that the pigeon story was not popular here, considering its effect on the man who had first met them at the door. So he wore a thinking cap on the way to the "parlor." This apartment was the only one that had a living look, all the others, noted in the passing, cheerless and empty. It was a "sky parlor," being reached by narrow stairway, only a garret between it and the roof. An old table, rickety chairs, portable cots and a rusty oil stove were in evidence. There was a wide fireplace with no fire in it. It occurred to Henri that the present occupants of the house did not approve of smoking chimneys. To get a line on what might be expected, he mildly inquired, with a pale smile: "Now that we are here, for what are we here?" He was certain that he himself could not win a prize with the correct answer. The cold-eyed man could not restrain a short laugh in his throat. "You are the fellow on the witness stand," he said, "but we must wait for the prosecuting attorney to help us along." In the waiting time the boys could hear through an open trap-door above them the fluttering and cooing of a score or more slate-colored doves, and it had just dawned upon Billy that there was some particular use for the sheets of oiled tissue and skeins of pack-thread that littered the table. CHAPTER XI. UNDER THE RED ROOF. THERE were no additions to the party in the "sky parlor" until after candlelight. The man called Fred was half-asleep on one of the cots, when suddenly aroused by repeated knocking below. He made stealthy descent, listened at the entrance for a moment, and apparently satisfied with the signal conveyed in the rapping outside, cautiously unbarred and opened the door. The person admitted did not come empty handed, for when he stepped from the stair-landing into the upper room he, and likewise Fred, were carrying market-baskets of goodly size.